Translation

Theotokos, help Andronikos Doukas protoproedros, protovestiarios, and domestikos of the Schools of the East.

Commentary

Same owner as BZS.1958.106.1355.

Andronikos Doukas is the son of caesar John Doukas, cousin of Michael VII and father of Eirene, the wife of Alexios I Komnenos. He was appointed domestikos of the Schols of the Orient in ca. 1072 and died as the monk Antonios on 14 October 1077. He is mentioned with all three of the titles that appear on our seals in a Patmos document by which he received in 1073 an imperial donation. See Polemis, Doukai, 55-59; cf. Zacos-Veglery, 1473 and Patmos, II, no. 50. See also BZS 1958.106.2491.

From an administrative point of view, the term Anatole was used until the 10th century to indicate (a) the territories that had previously belonged to the praefectura praetorio per Orientem that is, essentially, all the themes of Asia Minor together with those of Thrace and Macedonia; or, more realistically, (b) the territories situated to the east of Constantinople, that is, Asia Minor. In the 10th century the army command of the East was separated from that of the West (that is, Europe), Listes, 329, 341-42; cf. Oikonomides, Évolution, 141-42 and AP 35 [1978] 300, 328-29. The seals published here (and some others, such as the one of the stratopedarches of the East: Zacos-Veglery, no. 2780; Lihačev, Molivdovuly, 104, pl. LXIII,9; Seyrig, no. 159; or the hikanatoi of the East: Seyrig, no. 154) show that in the 10th and eleventh centuries the entity called the East comprised only military commands.

It should be noted, however, that in some cases the term Anatole seems to have been used to indicate a strategos of the Anatolikoi (cf. Winkelmann, Ämterstruktur, 78-79); and several civilian officials defined as ton Anatolikon could well wave authority over territories covering the East, well beyond the boundaries of the theme (see DO Seals 3, § 86, nos. 86.9, 86.17, 86.34).